


Hold On To Me

by fallenobsidian



Category: Supernatural
Genre: After the finale of season 8, Angst, Canon Divergence - Season 8/9, M/M, The end is fluffy though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-07-05
Packaged: 2018-04-07 20:47:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4277379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallenobsidian/pseuds/fallenobsidian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Confronting Cas might be the best thing Dean has done in a while.</p>
<p>"You seem to have a habit of leaving somehow when we start talking seriously, and there are several things we need to clear up."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Takes place after the Season 8 finale.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hold On To Me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [inthedarkdark](https://archiveofourown.org/users/inthedarkdark/gifts).



> First of all, MAJOR shoutout to Anette (inthedarkdark) for helping me fine tune this story and (lovingly) forcing me to publish it. This is the first thing I have published, so please be kind. Other than that, enjoy and thank you for reading!
> 
> Oh, and I don't own any of these characters or the show. If I did, this all would have been canon a long time ago.

“Cas, can I talk to you for a minute?” Dean asked, his appearance eerily calm despite the fact that he had just been pacing around the room. Castiel felt a wave of dread pass through his body, and for a moment it paralyzed him. Getting used to human emotions had been hard, and he was trying to keep them at arm’s length as much as possible. However, given the circumstances, his plan wasn’t working as well as he had hoped. Cas gave him a nod and reluctantly stood from his chair to follow Dean out of the room, leaving Sam and Kevin to regard their exit with silent curiosity. They walked through the long hallways of the bunker, or “bat cave” as Dean so often liked to call it, and eventually reached a descending staircase. As soon as they started walking down them, Cas knew exactly where they were going.

“Is this a necessary area to have this conversation in?” he asked as they entered the newly found dungeon. Cas had only been in it once, and it wasn’t a place he was eager to be in again. 

Dean closed the door behind them before answering. “You seem to have a habit of leaving somehow when we start talking seriously, and there are a few things we need to clear up.” The lock clicked into place and Cas immediately began feeling claustrophobic. “As you may recall, it took putting you in a ring of holy fire last time we really needed to talk.”

The comment caused a surge of memories to flood Castiel’s mind, ones that were more painful than he’d care to admit. “We’ve conversed since then, Dean. You may recall me being very forthright about what happened when you left Purgatory. And why I refused to go back to Heaven.” He watched the hunter closely for signs of hostility, but found none. Dean was standing calmly, his posture relaxed, his expression determined but inquisitive. The feeling that he was being analyzed crept up the back of Cas’ neck, but he kept his gaze steady and on Dean.

“Yeah, well, a couple things have happened since then,” he replied, a small chuckle escaping his lips. Cas shifted his weight uncomfortably, already aware of where this was headed. “Which would you like to talk about first? Running away with the angel tablet after beating the crap out of me, or managing to raise hell in Heaven once again?”

It was too much. Cas finally broke eye contact and turned away slightly, wishing he could just fly away. “Dean-”

“Look, I get it, I know. You’re sorry. But this isn’t something we can just walk away from like nothing happened. You’re human, Cas! And I remember very clearly what you were like the last time I saw you human, and I’ll be damned if I let that happen again. So if we’re going to get through this, we need to talk about it.”

The room was feeling entirely too small, and Cas could feel himself beginning to panic. His fingers twitched as he looked around the room for an escape, and he found himself reaching out for his grace, even though he knew it was long gone. The only result he got was a sense of emptiness. 

“There’s nowhere to go, man, you gotta talk to me,” Dean’s voice said, bringing him back to the present and the man standing right in front of him. Cas knew he was right, but this wasn’t a conversation he was ready to have.

“Dean, I can’t,” Cas replied, barely able to contain the mild panic he had begun to feel. 

“All I’m asking is that you be honest with me for ten minutes! Why is that so damn hard?”

“Because I know you, Dean. The last time we talked, you didn’t care what I had to say because you wouldn’t believe anything I said. There is nothing I can do that will erase the past, we both know that.” He paused to take a breath and found himself turning his gaze towards his feet. “I’ll never stop being sorry for what I did. Just as you will never forgive me for what happened.”

Dean took a step towards him, and he once again managed to raise his eyes to the hunter’s. “Cas, just because I get pissed at you, doesn’t mean I’ve shunned you for the rest of my life. But really can you blame me? I mean, I get it. You were under Naomi’s control. But damn it, you should have trusted me enough to tell me what was going on with the angel tablet. Instead you rabbit as soon as whatever connection you had was broken, which still makes zero sense. How exactly can you not know what broke it?” The longer Dean talked, the more intensity he got. By the end he was nearly shouting, making Cas want to retreat. He had no choice but to hold his ground, however. 

“You want to know what broke it, Dean?” Cas asked, feeling waves of both fear and frustration crash against his body.

“You’re damn right I do!”

“You!” Dean looked taken aback, and he had to blink several times before the expression on his face changed from shock to something much different.

“What?”

“You, Dean. You broke the connection. She made me choose between Heaven and you, and I chose you. I’ll always choose you.”

Dean stared at Castiel for a few more moments before shaking his head lightly and looking away for the first time. He turned around and took a step towards the door, his right hand pinching the bridge of his nose. “Why did you say you didn’t know?”

“Did you mean what you said?”

Dean didn’t look back at him all the way, however confusion was written all over his face and he forgot for a moment that Cas glossed right over his question when he stopped moving and turned his head ninety degrees. “What?”

“In the crypt, did you mean what you said?”

“Every word.” He spoke without hesitating, expression full of earnest despite the fact that he still didn’t understand why he was being asked.

Cas paused for a moment as he looked away, but returned his eyes to Dean when he began to speak again. “Naomi forced me to kill you a thousand times during my absence.” Dean immediately looked back at Cas, shock widening his eyes. “I remember every single one of them. I remember the cracking of your bones under my palm, the sound of your voice begging me not to, the smell of your blood after the final blow. Every time I did it, it became more and more automatic. But the one time I couldn’t do it was when you were in front of me, on your knees, telling me that you needed me.”

All Dean could do was stare until he finally managed to choke out, “I-I didn’t know.”

“I didn’t expect you to. I just wanted you to know that I didn’t just leave to protect the angel tablet. I left to protect you. Not only from Naomi, but also from myself.”

At that, Dean let out a small scoff and once again got closer to Cas. “Protect me? That’s rich. Cas, you leaving me without telling me jack doesn’t protect me from anything! Do you even remember Purgatory? How we did just fine even with you shining like a damn lightning rod? I’ve just about had it with you leaving me for some self-righteous reason. There is always going to be some new, terrible thing trying to kill me, and you know what, I’ve accepted that. So, the whole ‘I need to keep things away from you’ thing is just complete crap.” Cas found he could no longer keep eye contact and looked down at the ground. All that did was make Dean grasp his shoulders with a tight grip to get him to look back up again. “I told you that I need you and then you left me. What was I supposed to think, Cas?”

“I wasn’t ready to… admit my feelings. Even to myself.”

“What, and you’re ready now?”

“You aren’t really giving me much of a choice, Dean. You wanted the truth, and I’m giving it to you. While learning to deal with human emotions has been… difficult, I’m still me. I still do as you ask.”

Dean took a deep breath and allowed the grip he had on his friend to loosen before letting go of him entirely. “How is that going, by the way?” There was a pause in Castiel’s train of thought where he thought about just saying that he was fine. He didn’t figure that would go over well, however, and Dean could sense his hesitation. “Cas?”

“Not well,” he finally admitted, defeat evident in his voice. “It’s as if everything that I do has been amplified a hundred-fold, while also being enormously dulled down. My external temperature seems to change hourly, and I’m not used to being cold, nor hot. I can feel the grain in the wood of a table, but I am no longer connected to it. Everything is so loud, but the world has become silent. Dean, I don’t even know how to function anymore.”

Cas took a shuddering breath and noticed his eyes were becoming increasingly wet. Dean was watching him with a familiar expression of both worry and sadness.

“Cas, I’m sorry-”

“I don’t want your pity, Dean,” he interrupted roughly, turning away so Dean didn’t see the tears threatening to cascade down his face. Cas could hear Dean moving cautiously towards him, causing him to take a step closer to the wall.

“Cas-”

“Dean, no. This isn’t something that can be remedied by simply talking about it.” He finally turned back around to face Dean and found him closer than he had expected. “My grace is gone. My essence. Everything that I was has been ripped from my body, leaving me to die here in a muted agony. I’m useless, Dean. You’ve even said it yourself.” He took in a sharp breath and silently prayed to not lose control in front of Dean. “There is nothing grounding me here. Nothing to hold on to as I lose myself in the silence.”

“You have me,” Dean replied fiercely. “I’m right here. Cas, you’re not useless. You’re still you. And we can get through this. I promise you.” He grabbed his shoulders once more, gentler this time, and gave him a small shake. “Don’t give up on me now, Cas.”

The fallen angel pulled away from him, only to have his back greet the solid wall behind him. “Dean, I can’t.”

“Cas, don’t shut me out, not this time. Please,” the hunter replied, voice cracking slightly. “If you need something to hold on to, hold on to me.”

Castiel felt his heart thundering in his chest, and he about couldn’t take it anymore. “I… I just-”

“Cas-”

“I love you,” they said in unison. Both stopped and looked at each other, confused. “What?” they replied, still speaking together.

Dean took a step back, brow furrowed, while Castiel remained where he stood with a fairly blank expression. They stood in silence for a few more seconds before Dean spoke.

“You, uh, realize that I said it first, right? I was definitely the first person to admit that here.” He had a cheesy grin that was trying to be convincing, but Cas completely ignored it.

“I believe you’re wrong, Dean. While we said it together, I was slightly ahead of the curve. I beat you.” He had his eyebrows raised and was trying to not let the joy bubbling in his stomach out until Dean admitted defeat.

Judging by the expression on his face, Dean had absolutely no intention of losing this battle. “I realize you’re new to this human thing, Cas, but c’mon. There’s no way you said it before I did. Besides, I’ve been meaning to say it for a long time, so even if you very slightly beat me I technically have dibs.”

Cas squinted, making Dean shift his weight and cross his arms tightly across his chest uncomfortably. “Dibs?” Cas repeated slowly. “You think you have dibs? I raised you from perdition. Literally pieced you back together after your suffering in Hell. Left a brand on your arm so you would never forget. Do not speak to me of ‘dibs’. I clearly have you beat.” Cas’ fingers twitched slightly at the admission, but otherwise remained completely calm. 

Dean’s mouth went dry and he licked his lips. It took a few moments for him to reply. “Yeah, there’s that, but uh… Well… You can’t forget the… Crowley! Crowley, man! You chose to go to him to help you with your problems instead of me, effectively making you go nuclear. You forfeited your dibs the moment you turned to the king of hell instead of me.” Dean’s expression attempted to remain confident, but it was clear that he knew he had just brought up a sore subject.

Cas scoffed and tilted his head slightly before taking a step forward. “First of all, Crowley came to me. You were living a normal life with Lisa and I didn’t want to drag you back into this world after you had lost so much. There wasn’t any way I could compare with her in terms of companionship, and so I made a large mistake to ensure your happiness. I also believe you’re reaching because you’re losing. Just admit I said it first.”

“No. It was me. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Damn it, Dean, just-” Cas was cut off by Dean grabbing him by the tie and kissing him roughly. The stubbly hairs of Dean’s five o’clock shadow brushed against Castiel’s jaw and he kissed him back purposefully. Dean licked into Cas’ mouth passionately while caressing his jawline with his thumb and Cas felt a wave of heat course through his body. Then, Dean abruptly pulled away. Cas was so lost in the moment that it took a few seconds for him to catch up with the present tense and reopen his eyes. When he did, however, he was met with the sight of Dean’s gloating smile. 

“Fine, you said it first, but I kissed you first,” he said triumphantly. Cas rolled his eyes but couldn’t help but smile. He decided he’d give Dean that one.


End file.
